


Devour

by Rirren



Category: Warm Bodies - All Media Types
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Captivity, M/M, Suicide Attempt, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:14:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27718001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rirren/pseuds/Rirren
Summary: Julie fights and dies.Perry surrenders and lives.
Relationships: Perry Kelvin/R (Warm Bodies)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Devour

**Author's Note:**

> This was written years ago and at this point, is probably never going to be finished. I thought the fandom might be interested in it anyway. It's based on the book rather than the film.

I can smell the living from inside the high rise building, that bright, sparkling scent of vitality. I sense a lot of them inside there, possibly even as many as the Dead in our pathetic group I mustered up for the hunt but this fact barely causes me to reconsider, so strong is my hunger.

M steps up beside me, a frown on his face. “No,” he grunts.

I’m getting agitated. I gesture towards the building which is emitting the scent so thick it’s almost visible, a call to _come_.

“Eat,” I insist. M shakes his head and I say again, “ _Eat!_ ”

M still stands there looking unsure. Some of the other Dead are picking up on my extreme hunger, grinding their teeth in impatience but the rest of the group stand there silent.

“Need … to!” I explode. “Come!”

And I turn around and start stumbling towards the building faster than usual. To my relief the rest of the Dead follow instinctively and M catches up a second later, glancing at me with a worried expression. We crash through the revolving doors of the entrance and head for the stairs straight away with me in the lead. The rest of the group have been infected by my desperation and we take the stairs at a speed close to running, following that insatiable, aggravating scent of _food_.

We start to hear voices on the third floor and a couple of the Dead start groaning in response, alerting the Living to our presence, who yell and start blockading the door to the laboratory they are hiding in. But there is no time to put up a passable defence and the door falls quickly to our combined, mindless hunger.

It’s dark and disorientating inside, flashes from gunfire lighting it up and screams and yells and groans coming from every direction. M lunges for the nearest man, grabbing his arms while I rip out his throat, his scarlet vitality soaking me. I drop him to the floor and stand up, my brain screaming at me for _more, more!_ and I see two figures at the back of the room. The girl is screaming something at the boy, who is shaking his head and backing away. The gun slips through his trembling fingers and the girl snatches it up off the ground, roughly pushing him underneath the desk. She jumps up on the desk and starts shooting, the bullets cascading through the room and hitting a zombie standing next to me who goes down without a sound.

I snarl and leap at her, grabbing her boots and pulling her sharply forward. Her gun stutters out bullets at the ceiling but she doesn’t make a sound as she falls backwards, hitting her head against the edge of the desk. She’s dazed when I set upon her, unable to fight back and I grip her by the head and smash it against the floor again and again. Finally, when my hands are slippery with blood and her body is still I prise open her skull, exposing the warm, beautiful brain inside. I sink my teeth in and take a greedy bite –

xxx

I’m seven years old, watching behind a corner trying not to giggle as Dad waters the plant in the living room. He brushes at its leaves, removing the dead ones, his touch affectionate. It was mum’s idea to buy the plant but she forgot about it fairly quickly. Dad’s taken over caring for it and though he grumbles it’s clear he loves it really.

xxx

The school is burning. I run through the corridors, trying not to breathe in the smoke. The walls are bathed in a warm orange and everything is obscured by the claustrophobic smoke. There are shrieks and screams that seem to come from everywhere. I can’t hear the moans yet but I know they are behind me … the slowly rising bodies of my dead classmates.

xxx

I’ve just turned 11 and my Dad is showing me how to use a gun. We’re parked on the side of the road in the middle of a barren nowhere. Dad is holding my arms, bracing me for the backlash as I aim at the can several metres away. I squeeze the trigger and the gun jumps in my hand, the force pushing me backwards and making me yelp. Dad steadies me and I look up, yelling in delight when I see that I have knocked the can off the fence.

My mum is leaning against the car wearing a floaty summer dress and she smiles when I look at her eagerly for approval, but even I can tell that her smile holds a grimace of pain.

xxx

There’s a new guy in the classroom at school.

I take my seat across from him, looking over as I pretend to be occupied with taking out my pencil case. I don’t like school as much as I did before—whole subjects have gone and there’s no artwork on the walls, no personalization to the cold utilitarian classroom.

The guy has his head down, cradled in his arms like he’s asleep, his curly brown hair covering his face. I lay my head down on the desk too, curious to see a glimpse of his face.

And then I see a glint behind his bangs. He’s watching me too.

I sit up in a shot, my face burning red. When I finally glance over the guy’s getting his books out his bag. But he’s biting his lips, a suppressed smile on his face, and I find I’m smiling too.

xxx

“ _God_ , Julie.”

Perry’s eyes are wide and dark as he look at me, his face slightly red and his hair sticky with sweat. He looks at me like I am the only person in the world.

I reach forward and kiss him, cradling his face in my hands. Hot desire is burning in me, making me feel lightheaded. I can’t stand it anymore and I grab him, gasping his name into his mouth and guiding him inside me. I bite his lip as he enters me and finally rests fully inside me. I embrace him tightly as I relish this moment; of finally feeling full where I had been empty before.

xxx

We are both lying on the hot concrete roof underneath a cloudless blue sky. Looking up at only the sky you can kid yourself that around you the world is actually running as it should be. There’s no zombie apocalypse, it’s business as usual; kids playing in the park, commuters sipping coffee as they walk to work … people getting on with their lives.

Perry is lying right beside me, but I feel further away from him than ever. I know that right now we are imagining very different worlds. His mind is always somewhere I can’t reach and he won’t let me try. _You don’t understand,_ he says, again and again.

He’s slipping away from me bit by bit every day but I won’t give up. He’s pushed me away as a lover but I’ll be here as his friend … I’ll protect him … I’ll pull him back from the edge he’s walked right up to …

xxx

The scene starts to darken and the room comes back into focus, bringing the realisation that none of that was my life. I’m not one of the Living, my name isn’t Julie. I’m one of the Dead and my only memories of life are not my own. I feel more disappointed than usual at this revelation and I stare at the body beneath me for a few seconds, clenching my bloody hands in the blonde hair. I make the decision to keep this brain to myself; the memories in it are exceptional. I scoop the rest of the brain into my pockets and stand up slowly.

I’m not Julie … I’m not a young woman _living_ , fighting against the slow onset of death … I don’t have a lover called Perry …

The name jolts me and I hear the echoed thoughts of the young woman, her determination to protect him. I walk towards the back of the room and past one of the desks and I find him, curled up underneath in the hollow of the desk. The sight of his scrunched up body, the exposed skin of his back where his shirt is riding up awaken the hunger in me, to pull him apart and taste _his_ memories but something stops me. Maybe it’s the lingering feelings from the memories or maybe I just want to do something different, break this cycle.

I get down on my knees and crawl towards him, trying to appear nonthreatening. His arms are wrapped around his knees and he is staring blankly ahead. As I approach he stays still, his only movement a quick flick of his eyes in my direction. His reaction is not one I’ve ever seen before and I don’t know what to think. I’m used to the Living screaming and fighting back.

I’m face to face with him now. He glances down and then looks at me properly, in the eyes. The world seems to slow down and come to a halt in that moment as I gaze into his eyes. I’m staring at something I’ve always longed for, something the Dead always long for; _life_. The pink skin with warm blood pumping through it; muscles underneath still used for smiling and frowning; the constant movement of the eyes from one point of interest to another, so different from my own dead grey gaze. I could be staring at my own past.

And suddenly I am hit by a wave of longing and fierce jealousy. Why did he get to keep life and why did I have to lose it? Why isn’t he protecting his life with everything he has? Why can’t I take this life for myself? Just a little bit … life is spilling out of him, surely he can spare some for me…

A clatter from the other side of the room breaks our gazes. I’m hearing the struggles of the last person still alive here, though they will no doubt not be alive much longer. The other dead will notice me soon and my _find_ …

I crawl over to a fallen undead and pull its body over. A gun shot has caved in its head. I dip my hand into its wreck of a face, coating my hand in sticky, black not-blood. I paint Perry’s exposed skin with darkness, covering up his delicious scent of life. He makes no movement except to close his eyes while I brush the blood on his skin with gentle, clumsy hands.

I pull him to his feet when I am done and he follows obediently. He is probably in shock. M sniffs and looks at me suspiciously as we approach but I know that all he can smell is another undead, freshly risen.

We shamble outside; many of the Dead cradling body pieces to take back for others. I am still holding Perry’s hand, pulling him behind me. He makes no noise and no attempt to escape as we make our way back to the airport and I use the opportunity to escape into my mind as I so often do.

We are almost at the airport when M finally confronts me. From his obvious agitation he might have been trying to get my attention for a while, though I didn’t notice. He points at Perry and manages to croak, “Why?”

I shrug. I know what he’s asking. Prey has been so scarce recently that almost no-one willingly converts the Living. It’s a huge act of restraint, to stop yourself from eating the most delicious part, the brain, and let another one of us rise. I’ve only ever seen it happen accidentally, one of the Dead killed before they could finish.

“Why … not woman?” M grunts and cups his hands upwards in a crude representation of breasts.

I shrug again. If I could blush I would be blushing right now. M senses my embarrassment and starts laughing, or as near as laughing as a zombie can, more of a gurgling and gasping in the back of his throat. He lumbers over and grabs my hair, pulling it into pigtails while laughing, “Girl … such girl”.

I push him away in annoyance, trying to regain my composure, and glance at Perry. He’s watching the two of us with a blank expression; I can’t tell what he’s thinking.

I grab Perry’s hand and start walking again; determinedly ignoring M’s gurgles of laughter behind me.

A group of Dead are waiting for us when we finally arrive at the airport and they eagerly grab the body parts that we’ve brought back. It’s not as good as eating it fresh but not everyone can go on a hunt.

I hear some high pitched moans and look up to see my two children running towards me. They collide into me and hug me tight. I pat them on the head with quiet happiness at their energetic greeting. M hands me a severed elbow to give to them.

I see my wife at the edge of the gathering but she gives me a poisonous look when our eyes meet. I’m surprised but then I realise that I’m still holding Perry’s hand. Is she jealous? I think about going over to her but she wanders off before I make a decision.

My daughter gnaws on the flesh, getting blood all over her face as she gazes with big curious eyes at the man beside me.

I realise most of the other zombies are shooting the two of us curious glances, no doubt wondering what reason could have compelled me to turn one of the Living. I grip Perry’s hand a little tighter. I need to get him out of here before anyone realises what I have actually done.

I bend down to hug my two kids and grunt, “Go … mum.” They nod solemnly and sneak a last look at the strange man with their father before running off.

I pull at Perry’s hand and lead him away, walking as fast as my undead gait will allow me. We walk towards Gate 23, through the boarding tunnel and into the plane; my home. As I shut the door behind us I feel infinitely more at ease. This plane is my own private place; where I can sit in the airplane seats and imagine what the world was like before We came.

Perry is standing still in the aisle, his eyes unfocused and staring into nothing. I place my hands on his shoulders and guide him towards a seat, pushing him down gently to sit down. I take the seat across the aisle from him and lean forwards, studying his features.

His expression seems to clear when he’s sat down, as if he’s just woken up. His eyes search the cabin around him before settling on me. He stares at me and I stare back. He looks like he’s expecting something from me.

I drink in the sight of his face, still by human standards but full of life to me; twitching, blinking, beautiful life. After a long while, when whatever Perry was waiting for has not happened, he finally moves.

He gets up from his seat clumsily, tripping and crawling towards me. His body is shivering slightly. I’ve seen cornered humans tremble like this before.

Regardless, he carries on crawling towards me, face set with resolve. His hands land on my knees and he claws at me before pulling himself up into a kneeling position. He stays in that position for another few seconds, again as though he is waiting for something, but what I have no idea.

Then he brings up his hand to my face and slowly, slowly, starts to feed his fingers into my mouth.

I jolt, completely shocked. My teeth clench together automatically, holding Perry’s fingers tightly but not enough to break his skin. I want more than anything to bite down and taste his blood bursting in my dry mouth, but I don’t.

I have already decided that I won’t kill him. Part of it is a twisted penance for already killing so many, but most of it is the selfish desire to know the person from Julie’s memories, to have that wonderful thing for myself.

But I cannot resist my hunger completely, not with temptation being dangled right in front of me.

I bring my tongue forward and tentatively taste his skin, sucking my lips around his fingers. Perry shudders, his face twisting into a grimace of disgust. The taste is weaker than usual, his skin a barrier around the sharp, sweet-sourness of his blood and flesh.

Perry starts to talk softly, his voice low and soothing, like he doesn’t believe he’s talking to anything capable of comprehension and is just making sounds, as though soothing a wild animal.

“Sshhh, that’s it. Just bite down. I don’t mind, she’s gone, everyone I cared about is gone, take me too.”

I grab his hand when I hear his encouragement and suck greedily, my teeth gnawing gently on his fingertips, until I can’t stand it anymore. I spit his fingers out before I’m tempted to bite down completely and slap his hand away _. I can’t_.

Perry sits motionless, blinking at me. Then his chest convulses suddenly, once, twice, and he snorts air from his nostrils. I realise he’s actually laughing.

“Figures I would get a shy zombie,” he gasps, sounding hysterical. “Come on, what do I have to do, slice myself up and serve myself on a plate?”

I have been gaping at him the whole time and he reaches his hand towards my open mouth again. I bat it away and growl, “No”.

It’s Perry’s turn to gape at me.

“Y-you can talk?” he says in a hushed voice. A second later he continues. “…can you understand me?”

I nod and he stares at me,

“But you – what are you – why did you bring me here?”

I consider the question before shrugging. I didn’t really think this through before doing it.

“Are you going to kill me?”

I shake my head. I’m certain on that at least. It’s such a novelty to be around one of the Living for an extended period of time and I want to use that time to study him and learn how they are alive, what makes them different to us.

“N-not … eat,” I say. “Protect.”

His eyes narrow and anger overtakes his features frighteningly fast.

“Why?” he snarls. “I _wanted_ to die. That’s why I came out.”

I stare at him in shock, my mouth hanging open, making me look even more undead than usual.

“I’m not hanging around here to be some zombie’s pet!” Perry snarls, his hands clawing around my knees, his fingernails digging in hard enough that they would draw blood if I had any. “I let you take me for a reason and if you won’t do it I’ll find another zombie that will.”

Perry suddenly stands up, as if he’s about to run out of the plane and throw himself at a horde of Undead, so I jump up and force him back down. He fights me furiously, his eyes alive with a fire that unsettles me.

I’m not having that much trouble holding him, the Undead will always beat the Living in physical strength, but he’s flailing around so much I’m worried he’ll slip out of my grasp and run, and the Living will always beat the Undead in speed.

Finally I decide that passively taking blows and trying to hold onto Perry will solve nothing. I push him back hard and he stumbles and falls back over the arm rest. He struggles to stand up and I punch him hard across the face.

I step back, prepared to hit him again but Perry is suddenly still, clutching at the seat, face shadowed, body tense. He pushes himself up so that he’s sitting up on the airplane seat and stares at me, eyes narrowed.

“What the hell are you keeping me here for?” he spits out.

This is not going at all like I had envisioned. I hadn’t thought he would be this angry. I’d thought there would be talking; he could tell me about the world of the Living and I could tell him about my life here. And maybe, eventually, he would look at me the same way he did Julie.

I try weakly to explain. “P-p-protec-”

He interrupts me before I’ve finished spitting out this one word. “Yeah, you said that before. But what the hell is a _zombie_ doing protecting a living person? You some kind of pacifist zombie? A vegetarian zombie?”

The repeated use of the word zombie irks me, and I want to explain that it’s not what we prefer to call ourselves. But there’s an initial ‘n’ in my planned ‘ _Not zombie. Undead’_ speech, and they always give me trouble when I’m nervous. “N-n-n-n-n-”

Perry lets out a bark of laughter and starts mocking my stuttering. “N-n-n- _what?_ What do you want from me, you _undead freak!?_ ”

I shoot him an injured look. “R- _rude_ ,” I say.

He seems to think this is hilarious as well and laughs, but his laughter sounds high and hysterical. “Or-or are you getting some kind of sexual kick from this?” he manages to say.

This stops me right in my tracks and I pause to consider it, consider him. I notice there’s a real flare of fear in his eyes underneath his anger and bravado. But he doesn’t have anything to worry about, in truth I’ve never felt that, never even looked at a human like that. None of us feel those urges anymore; everything washed away by the all-encompassing need to _feed_.

Maybe some Undead, like my friend M, try to recapture this desire, try to act out what they’ve seen humans doing, but it’s nothing more than a sad imitation, like those fake plastic trees in the airport.

Except … well, I _hadn’t_ felt sexual desire before … not until that memory of Julie’s. I stop now, contemplating Perry. I could still remember how it felt, pleasure I could never have imagined, the exquisite feeling of completeness when he slid inside of me…

And now I’m sure that if I was still alive my face would be flushed a deep red with blood. As it is, I just stare at Perry, mouth hanging open and face pale as usual, lost in Julie’s memory. But I’m not insensitive. I can see that Perry is frightened so I shake my head.

Perry snorts. “Well, I don't know what you're up to but I don't believe you just want to protect me. Maybe you've just got some weird residual instincts from when you were human or something.”

I don’t say anything, just sink into the seat opposite him. Perry watches me but I don’t move and neither does he. After a while his body slowly sags, his face tilted and his eyes still watching me.

“Will you let me go?” he asks, his voice slow and flat.

I shake my head. Perry exhales through his nose.

“Whatever. I’ll probably wake up to you chewing on me in the middle of the night anyway.”

He blinks slowly as I watch, curious to see what he will do now. But eventually his eyes don’t open again and I realize he has fallen asleep.


End file.
